JROTC Drill Teams Matches Up Against Other Schools in District

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Every year, the Marine Corps JROTC competes in an Armed and Unarmed Exhibition Competition against all 13 JROTC schools in the district and on Saturday, April 21, 13 JROTC units met at Madison High School to compete.

“Last year, I was a part of both the Four-Man and Ten-Man Team. We did well, although there were a lot of weird things that day not related to our unit. I just hope this year we get everything right as a Unit and go out there and do our best,” said Senior Ten-Man Commander Cadet Lt. Col. Patrick DeLa Rosa.

“We get to learn beats, moves, and learn and gain more leadership skills on the Unarmed Team. This is my first year on the team. Hopefully, this year’s team does better than last year’s team,” said Sophomore Cadet Sgt. Natalia Trinh.

“An Unarmed Exhibition Drill Team consists of two separate groups. There is the Ten-Man Team and the Four Man Team that competes within the Brigades Regulations. Unarmed Exhibition is also considered as ‘fancy drill’ in JROTC and is making fascinating beats and sounds while still being in an in sync formation,” said Senior Unarmed Commander Cadet Maj. Alondra Borja.

“Previous Competitions have been quite interesting and competitive, in terms of Armed and Unarmed Exhibition. I can only speak for the Unarmed Team. I think we have exponentially progressed greatly throughout the years. Unarmed had the reputation of having a lack of accountability and commitment which affects our competitions,” said Borja.

“Unarmed Exhibition is a group of cadets choosing to partake in a Drill Team after-school. It is one of the JROTC semester two programs, alongside with Armed Drill. This Unarmed Team performs hand movements and claps in the form of beats. I’m expecting to learn a lot about how after-school JROTC programs work and how things are situated and organized,” said Freshman Cadet Lcpl. Megan Nonato.

According to Freshman Patricia Sourinfomy, the Unarmed Commander will give a command and the rest of the team members will have to execute the command in a domino effect usually. The entire routine is based on beats. With each beat, the team member will conduct a different move.

“Being a part of the team and being the Captain of the Unarmed Team gives me more hope for a better reputation than the Armed Team. In regards to placing in the competition, I believe that we can place at least in the top five schools for the Ten-Man Team. The practices have been mandatory and attendance has been crucial. My cadets have put in a lot of time and commitment. Having leadership experience and having fun practicing with my cadets over the last few months has been great,” said Borja.

“Overall, we did well. We did better in the competition than we were doing at the practices. No one dropped the rifle and the Unarmed Teams did very well,”said Junior Sgt. Brian Lim.